Isabel Beshar reflects on the emotions and challenges of her intern year… On my fifty second day of intern year, I deliver a fetus with its heart outside of its body. Ectopia cordis, my senior whispers to me. Our hands cover its moving chest. The heart beats within my fingers. Next to me, an eye […]
Latest articles
COVID-19 Omicron Sleep: A Harrowing Ordeal
Dr Samhita Panda explores the impact that COVID-19 infection may have upon sleep… The dreams were coming in fast, repetitive, flowing from one event to another, people and places from the recent and the past. How they were trying to knit a web of stories, … all this while I lay in bed sleeping while […]
Female Genital Mutilation in Africa: why is this still a troubling issue in modern times?
In this blog post, the authors explore the issue of FGM, highlighting the work that still needs to be done to address this problem. Female genital mutilation (FGM) has been a troubling global issue for decades, particularly in Africa and Asia. FGM is the removal of the external female genitalia or other injury to the […]
Human Connections That Travel Oceans
In this blog post, the authors discuss the human connections that can arise from working in even the most challenging of situations. The COVID-19 patient did not speak English, so we communicated using a translator phone. He taught me a few words and sentences so that I could ask simple questions to other patients who […]
The Surge in the New COVID-19 Variant in South Africa: A Threat to the Healthcare System and a call for global unity.
The authors discuss the need for a global response to new COVID-19 variants… The COVID-19 has been very unpredictable thus far, and it has once again surprised us, agitating and disorienting our scientists, medical professionals, and the general public. A new COVID-19 variant, the B.1.1529 known as Omicron, has been discovered. It was first confirmed […]
Omicron: A variant of concern
The authors discuss the emergence of Omicron along with its epidemiology, structural variation, diagnosis, and the current regional strategic plans to combat the virus spread. In December 2019 in Wuhan city of China, a cluster of patients presented to local hospitals with symptoms of cough, fever, and malaise. The causative virus was identified as the […]
Dealing with global vaccine hesitancy – the case of Ukraine
The authors discuss COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy in Ukraine. Vaccine hesitancy around the world has contrarily affected the battle against the overwhelming impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. This issue isn’t restricted to explicit geographic districts or social orders on the planet; different people and societies have various reasons for vaccine hesitancy. Some of the reasons are […]
Cheek-puffing in Bell’s Palsy
Dr Philip Welsby muses on the perils of trying to assess one’s own signs in the mirror… […]
Approaches to the amygdala by the medical and veterinary professions
Professor Terence Ryan discusses the range of stimuli which can be picked up by the forebrain and directed to the amygdala, suggesting how they might be used as therapeutic interventions by both the medical and veterinary professions. The forebrain receives many stimuli which it passes on to the amygdala known as the emotional centre. It […]
Unusual wounding influenced by the mind and demonstrating the power of the brain
Professor Terence Ryan discusses links between the amygdala and physical symptoms and signs such as psychogenic purpura. Medical students in 1950 at Oxford listened to Dr John Hunt talking about Indian Fakirs. The injury they could do to themselves without long term harm was fascinating. Since then this author has witnessed and photographed a sharp […]